Strange Bedpersons (21 page)

“If I’m going to behave all night, I need a drink,” Tess said.

“Get me one, too,” Park said behind them, and Tess turned to see Gina standing blankly beside him, her eyes red from crying, her face slack with fear.

“Gina?” she said. “Are you all right?”

“I’m fine,” Gina said. “I’m perfectly fine. Everything’s going to be fine. I’m ready to meet Park’s parents. Really I am. I’m fine.”

“I’m not,” Park said. “Get me a drink. We took a cab, so drunkenness is not a problem.”

“Gina, honey?” Tess asked.

“I’m fine,” Gina said again. “Can I have some gum?”

“No,” Tess said.

“Oh, hell,” Nick said.

The seating arrangements could have been better, Nick thought as he surveyed the situation. Somehow they’d ended up with the Pattersons on one side of the big round table, staring across at Park and Gina who had Welch on one side and him and Tess on the other. Park winced under his father’s gaze like a sinner on Judgment Day with a few things to explain about the little ethnic woman by his side who was obviously not Radcliffe material, while Gina sat, dazed with terror, across from Melisande, a woman who was never amused and often appalled. And clearly, Melisande had never had as much to be appalled about as she had now. In desperation Nick gestured to the waiter.

“Bring wine,” Nick told him. “Any wine. Now.”

“Very good, sir,” the waiter said.

Kent Patterson smiled tightly. “The Chateau Rothschild, Dennis.”

“Very good, sir.”

Kent Patterson commandeered the menu. “I’ll order for us all.” He didn’t see Welch roll his eyes as he began. “We’ll start with the gravlax and pumpkin soup,” he said, relaxing as he exerted authority. “And then the goat cheese and endive. It’s very good. Remarkable, really. Then the Muscovy duck, and for dessert crème brulee.”

“
Very
good, sir,” Dennis said to Kent.

“Steak,” Welch said. “Rare. Baked potato. And a bloody Mary.”

“Henderson is not going to be pleased,” Tess said to him.

“Henderson is not going to know,” Welch said to her. “Unless you rat on me.”

“I should for your own good,” Tess said. “Somebody should tell the truth and save you from yourself.”

Welch looked startled by her tone, but then Kent spoke to him and he looked away.

“What’s going on?” Nick whispered to her as Dennis arrived with the wine.

“The dinner party from hell,” Tess said. “You may want to leave now. It’s going to get ugly.”

Then Kent turned away from Welch and caught sight of his quivering son. He picked up his glass in disgust and drank his wine.

Melisande looked down her long nose at Gina without blinking and drank her wine.

Gina shook visibly and drank her wine.

Park sighed and drank his wine.

Tess looked at Nick, and they both drank their wine.

“So Park tells me you’re a Democrat,” Kent said to Tess. “That must make for some interesting conversations with Nick.”

“Oh, a few,” Tess said.

“Democrats,” Welch snorted, but he watched Tess with the same rapt attention he always gave her, only this time a little more warily than usual.

Kent smiled at Tess patronizingly. “So is it true that politics make strange bedfellows?”

“Really, Kent,” Melisande said with cold distaste.

“Bedpersons,” Park said, and everybody stared at him.

“What?” Kent asked.

“Bedpersons,” Park said again. “Tess would prefer bedpersons. It’s nongender-specific.”

“Don’t be an idiot,” Kent said, and Park flushed.

“He’s not,” Tess said, struck by Park’s thoughtfulness if not by his brains. “He’s right. I prefer bedpersons,” she lied.

“Politically correct garbage,” Welch said, but he sounded distracted.

“Not much conviction there,” Tess said. “Changing your mind?
Again
?”

“What?” Welch said, and now the wariness was palpable.

“Bedpersons? How odd,” Melisande said, and then she stared at Gina as if she was the offender.

“I think I’d prefer another drink,” Nick said, ignoring the bottle on the table in an attempt to distract Melisande. “Waiter?”

Another waiter brought more wine and genuflected, while Dennis presided over the distribution of the gravlax, bestowing it as if it were the loaves and fishes, instead of just the fishes.

Tess looked down at her plate. “What is this stuff, anyway? From the name, I thought it was going to be fill dirt.”

“Pickled salmon,” Nick said.

Tess looked at the oily pink slab in disgust. “If I ever go out to eat with you again, we’re going to Burger King.”

“Tell me about yourself, Miss DaCosta,” Melisande said to Gina when the salmon had been replaced by the pumpkin soup. She’d waited until Gina was sipping soup to ask, and Gina was so startled that she dropped her spoon in her bowl and splattered the peach tablecloth.

“Oh, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” Gina grabbed her napkin to mop up, and Park trapped her fingers with his hand and smiled at her.

“Gina is very talented,” Tess said. “She has a wonderful singing voice.”

“Opera?” Melisande inquired smoothly.

“No,” Park said. “Musical comedy.”

Gina smiled at him wanly.

Nick picked up the bread plate and shoved it under Melisande’s nose. “More bread?”

“No,” she said shortly, and turned back to Gina. “So where did you go to school? Perhaps we’re alumnae together.”

“Brush High School,” Gina said miserably. “It’s in Euclid. In Cleveland.”

“No, no, dear, I meant college,” Melisande said.

“Try the pumpkin soup, Mrs. Patterson,” Tess said. “It’s very thick.”

“I didn’t go to college,” Gina said. “I didn’t even graduate from high school. I went on the road with a touring company of
Oklahoma!
when I was sixteen, and that’s what I’ve been doing for the past eighteen years.”

“So, you’re a chorus girl,” Melisande said, pleased to have made her point.

“Yes,” Gina said, and drank all the wine in her glass.

Park began to turn an odd shade of pink under his tan. “Mother, I don’t think—”

“Did I tell you I saw Susan Vandervalk on the Cape, Park?” Melisande said. “She always asks after you. She’s just finished her master’s, and now she’s volunteering at the art museum. A lovely girl. You should call her. Remember how much fun you had with her that summer in Paris?”

“No,” Park said, and Melisande blinked at the word, while Welch choked on his bloody Mary and then grinned at Park in appreciation.

Tess knocked her fork on the floor and pulled Nick’s sleeve as she bent down to retrieve it.

“What?” he said when they were both below table level. He sounded both distracted and annoyed.

“You might want to announce publicly that we’re splitting up now, because I’m going to kill her before dessert and that way you won’t be involved,” Tess said, and Nick flinched at the words “splitting up.”

“Wait a minute,” he said.

Tess shook her head. “I know it’s not an adult thing to do, but that hag has it coming.”

“I agree,” Nick said. “But get a grip. You’ll just embarrass Gina more if you say something. This can’t go on forever. I think Gina and Park have the right idea. Keep drinking.”

“There’s not enough alcohol in the world,” Tess said.

“And we’re not splitting up,” Nick went on. “I hate that damn jacket, but we’re not splitting up over it. You can wear sackcloth and ashes if you want, but we’re staying together.”

“It’s not just the jacket. There’s more.”

Then they heard Melisande saying, “Really, children, the waiter will take care of the fork.”

They both swiveled their heads to see the waiter looking down at them.

“The waiter will take care of the fork, Tess,” Nick said, and crossed his eyes at her.

“Of course, how provincial of me,” Tess said, and they both straightened in their chairs.

“More wine, please,” Nick said to the waiter. “Keep it coming.”

By the time the soup was removed, they were all sitting in an alcoholic haze that somehow was not enough to cut the tension. A machete wouldn’t have cut the tension, Tess decided. Maybe a chain saw. Maybe if Dennis showed up in a hockey mask and...

Dennis showed up with the goat cheese.

“Ah, goat cheese,” Kent said when the salad plate was placed before him.

“Goat cheese,” Tess said, focusing on it through her wine fog. “I hate this stuff. We used to live in a commune, and I had to milk the goats so we could make this. You wouldn’t believe—”

Nick kicked her smartly on the ankle, and she realized she was blithering and shut up before she remembered that she was going to blither from now on whenever she felt like it. She opened her mouth to ask Welch if he remembered the goat cheese, but stopped when Melisande Patterson interrupted her.

“Goats?” Melisande looked at Tess with such tipsy horror that Tess wondered if this was the first time Melisande had realized that goat cheese didn’t just spring miraculously from the endive nestled next to it. “You had goats?”

“Of course, goats, Melisande,” Kent said in exasperation.

Melisande turned snapping black eyes on him, and Nick preempted her swiftly. “So, Kent, what’s new on the coast?”

“How amusing you should ask,” Melisande said, preempting in return. “We just had a lovely dinner with the Whitneys. Do you remember the Whitneys, Nick? You and Park dated their daughters in college. Bea and Bunny. Remember?”

“Vividly,” Nick said while Tess choked on her drink.

Melisande purred her approval. “Park was quite serious about Bunny. She asked after you at dinner, Park. She’s still quite lovely. You should call her.”

“No,” Park said flatly over his wineglass, and Melisande flinched.

“You know, I’m really enjoying this dinner,” Welch said.

“Wait a minute, is that true?” Tess said to Nick when she’d wiped her mouth. “They were actually called Bea and Bunny?”

“You find that amusing, Miss Newhart?” Melisande’s voice was cold.

“I find that hysterical,” Tess said.

“I don’t get it,” Gina said, peering at them as she lifted her wineglass.

“I believe Miss DaCosta has had enough wine,” Melisande said.

Gina blinked at her.

“Perhaps you’re not used to drinking wine, dear,” Melisande went on. “I’m sure Dennis could find you something you’d prefer. Perhaps a beer?”

Park’s flushed tan deepened to puce. “That’s enough, Mother.”

Gina drained her glass.

“She’s
Italian,”
Tess said to Melisande. “They
invented
wine. And they never named anybody Bunny and BeeBee.”

“Bunny and Bea,” Melisande corrected, her head only wobbling slightly from the wine.

“You think that’s an improvement?” Tess said.

“This is excellent goat cheese,” Nick said.

“More wine, please,” Gina said in desperation.

“How Italian of you, dear,” Melisande said.

“
Mother
,” Park said disgustedly.

“Listen, you—” Tess began, and then Nick knocked his fork off the table and pulled her down below the edge with him.

“Don’t do it,” he whispered to her. “I know she’s a horror, but don’t do it.”

“How come she’s the only one who gets to be rude?” Tess asked. “The hell with this civilization garbage. I’m taking her on.”

“No,” Nick said, and then Melisande said, “Children, the waiter will get the fork.”

“Thank God, you’re an orphan,” Tess said.

“Thank God we’re drunk or we’d have to kill ourselves,” Nick whispered back. “Listen, I love you.”

“What?” Tess said.

“I love you,” Nick said. “I don’t know what’s going on here, but I love you. I know you’re up to something, and I don’t give a damn. I love you.”

“Tell me our kids don’t have to take swimming lessons,” Tess said.

Nick was puzzled. “You want them to drown?”

“Children,” Melisande began again, and Tess pulled herself back upright, using the table edge for leverage.

“Look,” she said. “We’re conferring down here. The fork bit is just a subterfuge, okay? It’s a ruse. Deal with it.”

Then she ducked down next to Nick.

“Very smooth,” he said. “I think we’re off their Christmas-card list.”

“Oh, damn,” Tess said, and they both burst out laughing. Then Tess remembered Welch and stopped. “It’s not funny. This is terrible.”